Smartphones are insanely popular and are expected to continue to grow, according to a report on Cnet. Research firm IHS is expecting worldwide smartphone shipments to nearly hit 900 million units by the end of this year.

IHS is expecting smartphone shipments to reach 1.5 billion by 2017. To put this in perspective that would mean more than one out of every five people will buy a smartphone in one. For this year Apple expects to ship 150 million iPhone's, up from 134 million last year.

"The possible slowing growth of the iPhone and the rapid pace of competitive smartphones releases speak to the ferocious nature of the handset business, especially now as the market continues to pivot from a market dominated by lower-end handsets known as feature phones to one that is increasingly smartphone-centric," said IHS senior analyst Wayne Lam.

The key battleground is cheaper but well designed smart phones. Most of the competitors are doing this right now (Sony for Example has the XperiaJ)... Apple better hurry up with a cheaper iPhone or they may just lose out on a significant market share.

Sony just needs to get to that top 3, and maybe top 2 world wide, and then they can be back to a near dominant era... XPERIA Honami or whatever it's called releasing a year before the next galaxy device should help significantly